Rail chair



L. A. MATTHEWS. RAIL CHAIR. APPLICATION men SEPLZI. 1921.

1,4035906. j I Patented Jan. 17, 1922.

PATENT OFFICE.

LORRIN A. MATTHEWS, OF VICTOR, IOWA.

RAIL CHAIR.

Application filed September 21, 1921.

T 0 aZZ w hom it may concern.

Be it known that I, LoRnIN'A. Man TI-IEWS, a citizen of the United States, residing at Victor, in the county of Iowa, State of Iowa, have invented a new and useful Rail Chair; and I do hereby declare the following to be a full, clear, and exact description of the invention, such as will enable others skilled in the art to which it appertains to make and use the same.

The invention relates to rail chairs, and has for its object to provide a device of this character particularly adapted for use in connection with dredge tracks of the type where track sections are moved on their platforms and positioned in advance of each other by the dredge, as said dredge advances during its dredging operation.

A further object is to provide a rail chair so constructed that the adjacent ends of abutting rails may be easily and quickly secured in the chair by removable pins, and also to provide a flared guide portion on the chair, said guide portion forming means for guiding the end of a rail into abutting engagement with a rail end secured in the chair, thereby allowing platform sections having rails to be easily and quickly secured together.

With the above and other objects in view the invention resides in the combination and arrangement of parts as hereinafter set forth, shown in the drawings, described and claimed, it being understood that changes in the precise embodiment of the invention may be made within the scope of what is claimed without departing from the spirit of the invention.

In the drawings Figure l is a top plan view of the rail chair showing the same secured to a portion of a conventional form of platform track section, of the type used in connection with dredging and excavating machinery.

Figure 2 is a side elevation of the rail chair.

Figure 3 is an end view of the rail chair looking into the flared guide end thereof.

Referring to the drawings, the numeral 1 designates portions of adjacent road bed sections, of the type commonly called plat forms and of the type used in connection with dredging machines, wherein as the machine as a whole advances rail sections are shifted for continuing the track in ad- Specification of Letters Patent.

Patented Jan. 17, 1922. Serial No. 502,234.

vance of the dredge. It has been found that when the railway sections are connected to gether in the usual manner with fish plates or conventional forms of chairs that a great deal of time is lost in getting the rails in abutting engagement with each other. To overcome this difliculty a chair 2 is provided. which chair comprises a base 3 which may be secured to the road bed section 1 by means of bolts 4. Extending upwardly from the base 2 are spaced flanges 5, between which flanges the end 6 of the rail 7 is received, and held by a removable pin 8. which pin extends through the flanges 5 and the web 9 of the rail '7. Flanges 5 engage the side edges of the flanges of the rail 7 and hold said rail in the rail chair. Flanges 5 are provided with inwardly extending lugs 10 which overlie the flanges of the rail 7 after said rail has been placed in the flared portion 11 of the chair and guided to its abutting position with the end of the rail 7 by the angularly disposed flanges 12 which extend upwardly from the base 2 and are integrally formed with the flanges 5. It will be seen that when a track section is being placed in position in advance of another track section that the end of the rail 7 will be guided to abutting position with the end of the rail 7 and that after the rail has been so guided to position, the pin 13 is passed through an aperture in the web thereof and through notches ll in the upper sides of the flanges 5, said pin forming means whereby the end of the rail 7 will be securely held in place. It will be seen that the rails may be easily and quickly disconnected by removing the pin 13 and consequently the road bed sections maybe also disconnected thereby allowing the roadbed sections to be placed in advance of each other during a dredging or e cavating operation.

From the above it will be seen that a rail chair is provided which is simple in construction, and one wherein the chair may be cast in a single piece, thereby allowing the device to be cheaply manufactured.

The invention having been set forth what is claimed as new and useful is:

l. A rail chair comprising a base, upwardly extending parallel flanges carried by said base adjacent its ends for the reception of one end of a rail, means passing through registering apertures of said parallel flanges for holding the end of said rail in position, the forward ends of said parallel flanges merging into diverging extending flanges carried by the base, said diverging flanges forming guiding means for guiding the end of a rail into position between the parallel flanges, lugs carried by the parallel flanges adjacent their inner ends and adapted to overlie the flanges of the last mentioned rail and means carried by said parallel flanges for holding the last mentioned rail in position.

2. A rail chair comprising a base, upwardly extending flanges carried by said base, said flanges adjacent one end of the base being parallel and merging into out- 

